An ultrasonic diagnostic imaging system produces an image of shear wave velocities by transmitting push pulses to generate shear waves. A plurality of tracking lines are transmitted and echoes received by a focusing beamformer adjacent to the location of the push pulses. The tracking lines are sampled in a time-interleaved manner. The echo data acquired along each tracking line is processed to determine the time of peak tissue displacement caused by the shear waves at points along the tracking line, and the times of peaks at adjacent tracking lines compared to compute a local shear wave velocity. The resultant map of shear wave velocity values is color-coded and displayed over an anatomical image of the region of interest.

A signal processing method for performing processing of logarithmic compression with base k on to-be-processed signal (k being greater than 1), comprising: acquiring value of integer part of a result of logarithmic compression corresponding to the to-be-processed signal; calculating fractional part evaluation parameter Q according to the to-be-processed signal and the value of the integer part, Q=d*k.sup.T−N, d being value of the to-be-processed signal and greater than 0, N being the value of the integer part, T being a preset constant; evaluating, according to the fractional part evaluation parameter and a preset correspondence table, value M of a fractional part corresponding to the fractional part evaluation parameter, the correspondence table having different fractional part evaluation parameters and values of the fractional part corresponding to the fractional part evaluation parameters; obtaining the result of logarithmic compression according to value N of the integer part and value M of the fractional part.

In an ultrasound imaging system which produces synthetically transmit focused images, the multiline signals used to form image scanlines are analyzed for speed of sound variation, and a map 60 of this variation is generated. In a preferred implementation, the phase discrepancy of the received multilines caused by speed of sound variation in the medium is estimated in the angular spectrum domain for the receive angular spectrum. Once the phase is estimated for all locations in an image, the differential phase between two points at the same lateral location, but different depth, is computed. This differential phase is proportional to the local speed of sound between the two points. A color-coded two- or three-dimensional map 60 is produced from these speed of sound estimates and presented to the user.

An analysis apparatus includes processing circuitry configured to obtain quantitative values of a plurality of types of tissue properties relating to a region of interest of a subject, and generate a diagram of the region of interest based on the quantitative values.

Methods and apparatus measuring tissue nonlinear shear wave property are disclosed. When tissue shear responses are different to ultrasound radiation forces generated by pulses having different shapes, its nonlinear effect can be used to estimate tissue property at single location without measurements of group velocities or phase velocities. Ultrasound radiation force using a single tone burst pulse is applied to a selected location in a tissue region. The induced shear wave is detected in the region and its spectral distribution is calculated and analyzed. This detection may be repeated with other excitation pulses having different widths or different shapes at the same location. The spectral analysis of the detected shear wave is performed according to a nonlinear shear model for solving nonlinearity and viscoelasticity of the tissue at a single location in a tissue region. The detection location can be at one point at a time for imaging two-dimensional or three-dimensional tissue nonlinearities and shear wave properties. The property includes nonlinear magnitude variations, nonlinear phase variations, nonlinear coefficients, and viscoelasticity. The induced shear wave are detected at multiple locations along the shear propagation directions in the tissue region for calculating different shear group velocities and different shear phase velocities using different excitation pulses, and calculating nonlinearity and viscoelasticity. A difference between certain aspects of this disclosure and the prior art of ultrasound elastography is the utilization of nonlinear responses of the tissue shear property.

A method of displaying stereoscopic information related to an ultrasound sectional plane of a target object includes setting a line of interest on the ultrasound sectional plane of the target object based on a received input; obtaining an ultrasound signal of the ultrasound sectional plane of the target object along the set line of interest; converting the obtained ultrasound signal to represent the stereoscopic information in a three-dimensional manner; and displaying the stereoscopic information related to the ultrasound sectional plane of the target object.

An ultrasound diagnostic device includes a propagation information estimator that evaluates reliability of wavefront arrival time data in the wavefront arrival time frame data and, for reliability nonconformance wavefront arrival time data in the wavefront arrival time frame data that does not satisfy a predefined condition, generates compensated wavefront arrival time data by interpolation based on wavefront arrival time data that does satisfy the predefined condition, replaces the reliability nonconformance wavefront arrival time data with the compensated wavefront arrival time data, and generates compensated wavefront arrival time frame data; and an elastic modulus calculator that calculates shear wave propagation speed and/or elastic modulus frame data in the region of interest, based on the compensated wavefront arrival time frame data.

An ultrasound diagnosis apparatus according to an embodiment includes an obtaining unit, an image generating unit, and a controlling unit. The obtaining unit obtains setting information in which a plurality of types of ultrasound image data are set as display-purpose image data and in which a percentage of a time period to display the display-purpose image data is set for each of the plurality of types. The image generating unit generates, along a time series, each of the plurality of types of ultrasound image data set in the setting information. The controlling unit exercises control so that the plurality of types of ultrasound image data generated by the image generating unit are stored into a storage unit and exercises control so that the display-purpose image data is displayed on a display unit according to the percentage set in the setting information for each of the types.

An ultrasound diagnostic system (1) includes an ultrasound probe (2), a handheld type diagnostic apparatus main body (3), and a remote apparatus (4), the ultrasound probe (2) includes a position sensor (14) that detects a measurement position of the ultrasound probe (2), the diagnostic apparatus main body (3) includes an image generation unit (22) that generates an ultrasound image and a monitor (24), the remote apparatus (4) includes an organ detection unit (32) that detects an organ of a subject by analyzing the ultrasound image, a score of the measurement position with respect to an optimum position in a case of measuring the organ detected by the organ detection unit (32) by the ultrasound probe (2) is input to the remote apparatus (4) and is transmitted from the remote apparatus (4) to the diagnostic apparatus main body (3) to be displayed on the monitor (24).

Provided is an ultrasound diagnostic device having an elasticity evaluation function with which high accuracy and high reproducibility can be achieved while avoiding the influence of internal stresses. The ultrasound diagnostic device comprises: a transceiver which causes a probe for transmitting and receiving ultrasonic waves to transmit and receive first, second, third ultrasonic waves to and from a subject; an image production unit for producing an image on the basis of a received signal related to the first ultrasonic wave; a velocity measurement unit which sets a measurement region on the basis of the produced image, transmits the second ultrasonic wave to the measurement region to create shear waves, and calculates the propagation velocity of the shear waves from a received signal obtained by transmitting and receiving the third ultrasonic wave to and from the measurement region; and an elasticity evaluation unit for evaluating the elasticity of the subject on the basis of the calculated propagation velocity. The velocity measurement unit measures the propagation velocity at the same position a plurality of times. The elasticity evaluation unit derives an elasticity evaluation index using variations in the results obtained by measuring the propagation velocity a plurality of times.